


Prolonged Use May Cause Headaches and Other Side Effects

by beren



Category: Primeval
Genre: F/M, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2009-04-03
Updated: 2009-04-03
Packaged: 2017-11-03 05:22:41
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 9,336
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/377748
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/beren/pseuds/beren
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Connor is testing a device for controlling anomalies that comes from his research on the incident at the British Museum when things go wrong.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Why Messing With Anomalies Is A Bad Idea

**Author's Note:**

> Connor is my woobee, I make no excuses for that. I plan to do many weird and wonderful things to him because it's fun and this it the first. I hope you all like it. Thanks to Soph and Al for the beta.

There was a pounding in his brain and an aching in his chest and the first thing that drifted through his mind was that he must have hit his head again. What he really didn't expect to see when he opened his eyes was Abby's tear stained face.

"Oh god, Connor," she said as soon as he blinked at her, and then he found himself on the end of a very fierce hug.

Given that there seemed to be lots of people standing around looking at him and most of them looked upset, he began to think he had done something worse than hit his head. However, he couldn't for the life of him remember what it was.

Three hours later, he was sitting in the ARC's break room with his third cup of tea wondering if the headache would ever go away. He'd been prodded and poked and given a clean bill of health by a very nice doctor, but, since he'd been clinically dead for two minutes that morning, no one was letting him go back to work. He still didn't remember what he had been doing, but then he didn't remember most of the morning either, which he had been assured was perfectly normal. According to the professor he'd been testing out the anomaly they had all gone to with the prototype device he'd been working on to see if he could recreate the effects he'd seen in the British museum, only the anomaly had bitten back. Abby had described it as a six foot arc of energy that had tried to fry him.

What he really wanted to do was get to his computer and see if it had recorded anything interesting, but no one was allowing him to do anything. Yes he had a blinding headache, which he was assured would get better, but he was positive that if someone just gave him some aspirin he'd be fine. However, he had been sat down in the break room, told to relax and not do anything until Abby had finished her report and could take him home. He had tried to sneak out once and had been chased back by Lester of all people. It seemed that everyone had been threatened with the wrath of Abby if they so much as let him pick up a memory card.

All the attention had been flattering for about the first twenty minutes, but he was now desperate to analyse any data there might be. The anomaly had done something they hadn't seen it do before and he wanted to know why and what. The fact that it had nearly killed him made him want to understand it all the more. He was feeling a bit weird, but he was also dying to figure out what had happened. He had done all the calculations about what had happened in the British Museum and he was sure he should have been able to recreate the effect, but instead he'd almost died. He really needed to find out what he had done wrong.

The fact that he couldn't remember what he had been doing was very frustrating and he glared at the magazines on the table while trying to make his brain cough up the information. He wasn't really looking at them, but they gave his eyes something to do while he chased down any memories in his uncooperative mind. The problem was there didn't seem to be anything there to find, it was like his brain was a hard drive and the data about the morning had just been wiped away. Unfortunately he didn't seem to have the software to recover the lost data.

"Bugger," he said, annoyed at himself and the world in general and all the magazines fell off the table.

That rather shocked him out of his annoyance, since he hadn't been expecting that in the slightest. Grumbling to himself about people with an inability to stack, he put his tea down and bent down to pick them all up. The problem was that bending over made his head pound even more and he had to sit back before he'd picked up more than two. It was worse than the most awful hangover and he pinched his nose and closed his eyes, trying to make the thumping stop.

"Been destroying the place?" Abby's voice made him open his eyes again and he immediately wished he hadn't as his head throbbed in defiance.

"Someone can't stack," he complained back and rubbed at his temples.

"Head still bothering you?" Abby asked in a much more sympathetic tone.

They had given him some pain killers when he'd been examined, but they didn't seem to have helped much and the effect that they had managed to have seemed to be wearing off.

"Yeah," he admitted.

"Well let's get you home then," Abby decided, picking up the magazines for him.

The slippery publications had managed to make an impressive arc on the floor.

"You should be able to have some more pills by the time we get there," Abby continued to talk, "and then you can sleep off the headache. Your brains will only be slightly scrambled like normal by morning I'm sure."

He would have made a comeback about the scrambled brains, but he really couldn't be bothered. If Abby wanted to mother him, he was going to let her and when she pulled him to his feet he went meekly; anything for a bit of peace and quiet.

====

As it turned out, dying and being brought back seemed to have taken a lot out of Connor, because, when they had reached home, he had fallen into bed even though it was only three in the afternoon and he hadn't woken up until the next morning. It wasn't early either and he'd stumbled to the bathroom, got dressed and managed to make coffee before he found the note from Abby telling him that she had gone to work and he had the day off whether he liked it or not.

He felt fine and he wanted to get on with analysing what had happened the previous day, but he did have enough self preservation instincts not to go up against Abby on this one. Rex had tried it after being injured in the whole Leek incident and had ended up in a cage for three days for his own good. Connor didn't want to end up in a cage.

Resigned to his fate, he eyed the TV and the DVDs they had rented, but not yet had a chance to watch. If he was being forced to have the day off he was doing it properly and he began to potter around the kitchen, preparing snacks so that he could sit in front of the TV and move as little as possible. His head wasn't aching like the previous day, but it did feel a little delicate, so vegetating in front of a couple of movies didn't seem like such a bad idea.

Arranging things carefully, he set up his area so that everything was within arms reach and then he put on the first DVD. With Rex sitting on the chair behind him, watching almost as closely as he was and chirping in response to his comments, it was almost like having a real person to watch the movie with.

Two DVDs and more junk food than was good for him later, he had just sat down to start the third movie when he realised he'd left the remote next to the player when he'd changed discs. He was feeling lazy and lethargic thanks to not moving for so long and he moaned as he realised what he'd done.

"Hey, Rex," he said, turning to where his current companion was happily watching him and the TV, "couldn't get the remote for me could you, mate?"

It was a faint hope; Rex wasn't overly good at fetch, but he had to try. Rex just chirped at him and turned his head on one side: so much for that plan.

The remote was sitting on the DVD player, taunting him from across the room, and he knew he was going to have to stand up again, but he was comfortable. He glared at it as if it was in the wrong and then two things happened at the same time; the remote moved and the DVD started to play. Connor was on his feet in a second, behind the chair and looking for whatever had touched the remote.

"Do you see anything, mate?" he asked Rex, but the small dinosaur just looked at him as if he was a little insane.

It took him five minutes of looking very carefully before he dared venture across the room. His survival instincts were very well trained thanks to working with anomalies all day, every day and he checked everything before he went any closer. The thing was, there didn't seem to be anything there, nothing at all to explain what had just happened and when he picked it up, the remote was perfectly ordinary. He just couldn't work out what had happened, but one thing he did know was that he didn't fancy watching TV anymore.

Deciding that he was being ridiculous, he turned off the DVD and the TV and walked over to the kitchen to make some proper food for lunch. His head was aching gently again and it was probably too much junk in his system, so real food was the answer. A lorry must have gone by or something and caused the remote to move. There was a logical explanation somewhere and, as he set about creating a sandwich, he decided that after lunch he would do a few tests and figure it out. He had just chopped a tomato when his sleeve caught on the knife and knocked it off the side; straight towards his foot.

"Fu..." he began to swear and then his voice cut off as something very freaky happened.

The knife stopped in mid air a couple of inches from his foot and just hung there. It did not sway, it did not turn and in fact it did not move at all as he slowly backed away. He took his eyes off it for a second as he tried desperately to remember where his phone was and there was a thunk and he looked back to see it lying on the floor.

"Oh shit," he said and then hightailed it out of the kitchen area.

It took him about a minute to find his phone and then he dialled Abby.

"Connor," she greeted almost immediately, "what's up?"

"We've got a poltergeist," was what he told her as he looked round the room wondering what would happen next.

"A what?" Abby asked, clearly not believing him.

"A poltergeist," he repeated, trying to calm himself down a little. "The remote moved and the DVD started and the knife floated."

He was just a little freaked out.

"Connor, slow down," Abby said in a very calm tone from the other end, "now what's going on?"

"Things are moving by themselves," he said in as clear a way as he could.

There was silence from the other end of the call.

"I'm coming home," is what Abby said when she finally spoke, "just don't do anything, okay?"

"Um, okay," he replied, a little unsure if Abby believed him or thought he had lost it, but either way, at least she was coming back.

He spent the time it took for Abby to get home sitting on a chair in the living area with an electrical field metre he had fetched from his room and watching for anything odd happening. Strange things usually made him look for explanations, but this had him really spooked, so much so that he nearly jumped out of his skin when he heard Abby's key in the lock. He was on his feet and over to her before she was fully into the apartment.

"Connor, are you okay?" she asked, looking him over critically.

"Yeah," he said, since now that Abby was home he was beginning to feel a little stupid, "but weird things happened."

Abby dumped her coat and bag and walked with him back into the main part of the flat and she saw him look at his half made sandwich on the side.

"I didn't want to go back over there," he said, a little sheepishly.

"Tell me what happened," Abby instructed, seeming to realise he was somewhat on edge.

"I was relaxing like you told me to in your note," he said, going over everything in his head, "and I was watching DVDs, only I left the remote by the TV. I tried to get Rex to go pick it up, but you know he's no good at fetch, and then it moved and the DVD just started going like play had been pressed. When I looked there wasn't anything there so I thought it was just a fluke and I went to make lunch and then I dropped the knife, only it didn't hit the floor it floated for a bit and only hit the ground when I looked for my phone."

"It floated?" Abby asked in a sceptical tone.

"Floated," he confirmed, "a few inches above my foot."

Abby frowned then.

"So it would have hit your foot if it had fallen all the way?" she asked, and Connor was not sure what she was thinking.

"Yeah," he admitted; he hadn't considered it that way before.

"And you wanted the DVD on?" she asked next and Connor began to realise what she was saying.

He nodded as it dawned on him.

"Both were things I wanted," he said as it became blindingly obvious.

Abby didn't seem to mind that he had missed what should have been staring him in the face.

"Well at least if we're haunted, it's friendly," Abby commented and walked into the kitchen area. "Did you get anything on your meter?"

Connor looked down at the equipment in his hands.

"Nothing," he replied since there hadn't even been a peep.

Abby was looking around and ducked down behind the counter, coming back with the knife and putting it on the side.

"There's no sign of anything here," she said in a very scientific manner; "nothing that might indicate invisible creatures or anything like that. So we must be dealing with something else."

Connor walked over, feeling much braver now that Abby was there as well.

"Let's do an experiment," Abby decided and gave him a smile. "Things that you wanted, happened, so let's see if we can see it again. Hungry?"

He nodded, he was rather peckish even if Abby's idea did make him nervous.

"Then you probably want this sandwich, right?" she asked, putting the top on the half made meal for him. "Stand at the end of the counter and, well, want it."

It seemed a rather odd thing to do and Connor felt a little silly, but he couldn't fault Abby's scientific method.

"Just want it?" he asked dubiously.

"Yeah," Abby replied with a nod, "that seems to be the kind of thing that caused the incidents before."

Standing there staring at a sandwich made Connor feel even more stupid, but he did it. He was rather hungry, having promised his stomach food and then failing to deliver, so he concentrated. What he was expecting he wasn't sure, but, when the sandwich slid an inch or so down the counter, he stepped back as Abby swore. He would probably have used some very colourful language as well, but his headache chose that moment to resurface and he pinched his nose instead.

"Your head still bothering you?" was not the question he expected Abby to ask after having seen a moving sandwich.

"Yeah," he admitted, eyeing his lunch suspiciously, "headache keeps coming back every now and then."

"Every now and then after the poltergeist incidents?" Abby asked next and Connor really didn't know where she was going with her questions this time, but nodded anyway.

The damn headache really was annoying.

"Conn," Abby said in a very serious tone, "I don't think we have ghosts, I think we have you."

"Huh?" was about all he could manage in reply to that; what Abby was saying didn't make any sense.

"I think," Abby told him in a very understanding tone, "that you did that."

She pointed at the sandwich and Connor finally realised what she was implying.

"Don't be silly," he said as that just struck him as ridiculous, "how could I do that. 'Use the force, Luke' doesn't really count in real life."

Abby was looking at him with one of her 'stop begin an idiot' looks.

"Connor," she said as if pointing out the obvious, "yesterday you almost died. You got zapped by an anomaly in a way no one has ever seen before. Who knows what it could have done to you."

"It was just like lightning," he protested.

"It was not just like lightning," Abby replied firmly, "I saw it pick you up, completely surround you and then throw you fifteen feet."

"I'm still not telekinetic," he said, refusing to believe the idea, "that would be ... that would be ... huge."

When he finally let himself consider what she was saying, he felt like he might want to sit down.

"Conn," Abby said, placing a hand on his arm, "are you okay? You've gone really pale."

When he was a kid, well actually most of his life, Connor had dreamed about being a superhero or something like that and telekinesis had seemed so incredibly cool, but, faced with the possibility it might be real, he found himself shit scared.

"You really think that I might..?" he couldn't even finish the question.

"Maybe," Abby replied and gave him a supportive smile, "let's try again and see. Can you push the sandwich away?"

Nervous didn't quite cover it, but Connor did as he was asked; he looked at the sandwich and basically willed it away. It took about a minute and this time he was looking for it, so he felt something and then the sandwich moved back to where it had been.

"Bloody hell," was all he could think to say and then the stab of pain hit him between the eyes and he winced.

The headache was not a good side effect.

"I think," Abby said, rubbing his arm gently in a very supportive gesture, "that makes it official."

Now Connor really needed to sit down.

"We should take you to the lab," Abby said after a few moments, "get this checked out."

"Oh god, not today," Connor responded almost instantly, he couldn't think of anything worse, "I don't think I can cope with been prodded and poked, not after yesterday."

Abby looked sympathetic, but serious.

"Conn," she said gently, "this is important and we need to make sure those headaches aren't a bad sign."

Connor really, really did not want to become a lab specimen.

"Tomorrow," he said somewhat desperately, "can't we wait until tomorrow. I swear I won't try and do anything until then and for all we know this might be a temporary thing and it'll be gone by the morning and then they'll have been prodding me for no good reason and..."

"Okay," Abby broke into his begging, "I get it. Stop panicking. You're supposed to have the day off and I told the others I was coming home because you were feeling bad, so they won't be expecting either of us today. We'll wait, but, and I mean it, if anything weird happens before then, I'm packing you in the car and taking you to the ARC, okay?"

Connor nodded, more relieved than he could possibly say.

"Can I eat that now?" he asked, looking at the sandwich and trying to distract himself from his thoughts.

Abby laughed at that, which was just the reaction he was after.

**End of Part 1**


	2. Why Bad Ideas Sometime Have Useful Side Effect

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Connor is testing a device for controlling anomalies that comes from his research on the incident at the British Museum when things go wrong.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Connor is my woobee, I make no excuses for that. I plan to do many weird and wonderful things to him because it's fun and this it the first. I hope you all like it. Thanks to Soph and Al for the beta.

It was the most wonderful dream, floating around on the breeze looking at things without a care in the world and Connor probably would have stayed in it for ages if he had been able. A rather startled exclamation of his name is what dragged him out of it. He woke up, realised something didn't feel right and then hit the bed with a thump and a yelp. His confused brain wasn't sure what had happened.

"Oh my god," Abby said from where she was standing next to the stairs, clearly having come to wake him, "you were floating. You were two foot off the bed at least."

"Um, I was dreaming about flying," he admitted in a bemused tone; this was getting too weird, even for him.

"Right," Abby decided, seemingly at the end of her rope as well, "get your arse up and dressed, we're going into work and finding out what the hell is going on, because if I have to strap you down every night to stop you floating off, we're going to be getting a reputation I don't think either of us wants."

And with that she marched back down the stairs and Connor was left to kick the rest of his brain into gear. Abby did at least present him with a cup of tea as she herded him out the door which meant by the time they made it to the ARC he was at least sentient. However, the moment they stepped into the building, what with his brain being on, that meant his nerves kicked in full force.

"Stop looking so nervous," Abby said as they checked in, "they'll think you're up to something."

"They always think we're up to something anyway," Connor pointed out.

"Most of the time they're right," Abby admitted and dragged him in the direction of the labs.

The professor and Sarah were already in the room when Abby all but bodily pushed him through the door.

"Hi Connor," the professor greeted, looking up and smiling, "feeling better I hope?"

"Kind of," was all Connor could think of to say.

"There have been interesting developments," Abby started spilling the beans almost straight away.

The professor looked alert at that, but not alarmed.

"What kind of developments?" the professor asked, putting aside what he and Sarah had been looking at.

Connor wasn't quite sure what to do, or say for that matter.

"Connor, just show them," Abby said as if she was reading his mind.

"Um, I can't," he said, suddenly even more nervous than before.

Abby gave him the look that could tame wild beasts and he knew he had no choice.

"Just show them," she told him, but not unkindly.

That was it, it was do or die and so he picked a target. There was a coffee cup sitting on the desk in front of Sarah.

"Watch the cup," he said, feeling as if he was about to strip naked or something equally as exposing.

Sarah looked dubious about what they were doing and why they were doing it, but the professor just looked at the mug as if it was a perfectly normal request. That at least made Connor feel a little better. He fixed his eyes on the mug and then concentrated, searching for what he had felt the previous day and that morning when he had woken up, and it came surprisingly easy this time. In only a couple of seconds the mug slid willingly across the desk's surface.

"Oh my god," the professor said, staring at the mug and then looking up at him, "that was you?"

Connor nodded, after all that was the point he had been trying to illustrate. He rubbed his forehead as it twinged, but he was beginning to realise that the ache was nowhere near as bad as it had been the day before.

"Excuse me," Sarah said, sounding somewhat doubtful, "are you saying you moved that with your mind?"

"That's exactly it," Abby answered for him, since his heart seemed to be stuck in his throat and was making it difficult to talk, "and that's nothing. When I went to wake Connor this morning he was levitating two feet off the bed."

"Flying," Connor hastened to add as he blushed furiously, "I was dreaming about flying."

The professor was looking at him with an honestly amazed expression and it made him very, very nervous.

"This is amazing," was what the professor eventually said and then smiled at him, which made him feel a hell of a lot better, "and it's since your encounter with the anomaly?"

"I think so," he replied, since that was the only thing that had happened to him lately. "I think I did something first when we got back here. There was a pile of magazines on the break room table and I think I pushed them off when I got annoyed, but at the time I thought they just slipped. Then a couple of things happened yesterday and I kind of panicked."

"He thought we were being haunted," Abby provided and made him want to brain her.

"Well what would you have thought if things suddenly started to move on their own?" he defended himself.

Abby gave him a small smile and a pat on the arm.

"But when he does it he gets headaches," she dobbed him in on that too.

"They're not as bad as they were yesterday," he added, because he didn't want anyone worrying, but the professor was already frowning.

"Any pain could be bad," his mentor decided quickly, "we had better get you checked out. It might just be like using a muscle; it takes time to get used to it, but we need to be sure. Then we need to find out what you're capable of. This is incredible."

Connor let himself be steered out of the room and towards one of the other labs, resigned to his fate.

====

An hour and a half later and the basic tests were done, luckily by someone who knew something about human biology rather than dinosaurs and Connor at least had the verdict that there was no brain damage that anyone could see. However he was rigged up to some monitoring machine with little pads stuck to various places on his forehead and scalp. Now came the interesting bit.

"If I may be so bold as to enquire," Lester chose that moment to walk in, "what exactly are we playing at today?"

"We're testing Connor's telekinetic abilities," the professor said in the usual tone he used with Lester.

"His tele-what now?" Lester asked, being, from what Connor could tell, deliberately obtuse.

He sometimes wondered how well Lester and the professor might actually communicate if they didn't spend the entire time being deliberately vague with each other.

"Telekinetic," the professor replied, fiddling with the machine to which Connor was attached.

"And exactly what do we hope to gain from this line of research?" Lester asked.

It was obvious no one had filled their boss in on what was going on. Just a little fed up of being examined and prodded, Connor decided to go for shock value. He held out his hand and willed a scrunched up ball of paper from the other desk to come to him. The machine began whirring the moment he did it and Lester's eyes went gratifyingly round.

"Good god," the man said, recovering himself, "when exactly did this happen and why has no one seen fit to tell me about it?"

"It only really started this morning," Abby lied smoothly for him, for which Connor was grateful, "hence the tests. We were going to tell you as soon as we actually knew what was going on."

Lester did not look happy, but it was difficult to remain upset with Abby when she smiled sweetly, which was exactly what she was doing. It could have gone downhill from there, but as it turned out, an anomaly chose that moment to rescue them as the alarm went off.

"Looks like we'll have to do this later, Professor," Connor said, never more glad to hear something in his life.

He very happily pulled off the sensors one by one and then followed the others out of the lab. About all he was praying was that by the time they got back, Lester hadn't had him labelled as dangerous and had a little room set aside just for him with a large lock on the door. He didn't think Lester was really like that, not like Leek had been, but he was never totally sure.

====

The anomaly was in the middle of a condemned estate of very old flats, which thankfully meant no people, but made Connor think of everything post apocalyptic that he had ever seen. It didn't help that he felt weird as soon as he piled out of the four by four with the others as they moved in for their first recon. The air around an anomaly was always charged and it was like being in a room with lots of computers; you knew about it, but now it was different. It was like he could feel the anomaly's energy thrumming in the back of his head.

"Connor, you okay?" Abby asked quietly as they waited for Becker to tell them it was safe to approach.

"What? Yeah," he said, shaking himself into gear, "just remembering what the last one did to me, I guess."

Abby patted him on the arm and gave him a supportive smile before, of one accord, they walked over to where the others were standing. They had a job to do and Connor was determined that whatever he was feeling was not going to affect it. When the professor told him to figure out the details of the anomaly, he went to it with his usual enthusiasm, or at least he hoped it at least looked like it was with his usual enthusiasm.

It didn't appear as if anything had come through, by the lack of tracks and things like that, but while he did his usual stuff, most of the military guys and the rest of the team spread out to look around. Becker stayed with him, coordinating the exercise and making sure there was someone with a gun covering each member of the rest of the team, which amused Connor somewhat. Becker seemed to be taking their personal safety very seriously and he had a bet with Abby about how long it would be before the professor had had enough of the babysitting.

The anomaly was still making the back of his head hum, but he concentrated on his readings instead. He almost had a fix on things when something changed and he found himself looking up at the anomaly rather than his laptop screen.

"Something's coming through," he said, not knowing how he knew, but just knowing it and, without thinking about it, he grabbed Becker's arm and dragged him away.

Then everything went to hell for a while as something very large and very nasty decided it wanted lunch.

It was big, had very large teeth, the tranquiliser wasn't working and bullets didn't really seem to slow it down all that much. Not really the greatest combination possible in Connor's opinion as he ducked into a doorway. He hadn't had time to look it up, but he thought it might be a tarbosaurus. The fact that it seemed to have decided he would make a good meal was not overly settling and he hoped it had picked another, better armed target, because he was getting fed up of running. Becker had tried to distract the thing, but it seemed to Connor as if he had a big neon sign above his head saying 'All you can eat buffet' because the beast was still chasing him. At least Becker was there to fend it off with more than the plank, which was the only weapon Connor had since the tranquilizer hadn't worked.

Becker was on the other side of the door they had just run through, next to a boarded up window, and Connor hoped the man had a plan. He was beginning to think he should take up sprinting for a living, since he was getting very good at it. It was amazing how a little fear gave a guy an edge. Not that taking a raptor to the Olympics to chase him down the track would be a wildly popular idea. He almost smiled at the imagined look on Lester's face, when everything went downhill again.

The wood beside Becker splintered inwards and a very large head came through. That would have been okay if Becker hadn't ended up with his vest snagged on one of those very large teeth and before Connor could react the captain was being dragged back through the broken wood. It never really occurred to him not to follow as he heard Becker yell and he had sudden mental images of the team being down one captain.

The tarbosaurus had Becker by the back of his bullet proof vest and appeared to be very serious about trying to eat the man. With a flick of its head it went to reposition its prey in a way that Connor had seen too many times on documentaries, and these days in real life, and Connor decided enough was enough. As Becker went up in the air, Connor threw out one hand in what he belatedly realised was an unnecessaryly dramatic gesture, and Becker did not come back down, in fact he continued going up for about six feet until he was well out of reach of the teeth trying to eat him.

Connor felt the pain start behind his eyes almost instantly and the feeling of the anomaly's energy didn't help in the slightest. Of course the one thing he had failed to take into consideration was that the tarbosaurus had thought he was tastier in the first place and with Becker out the way, he became the target. That meant there was several tonnes of dinosaur bearing down on him with very annoyed haste.

Thinking really was overrated in such situations and so he reacted instead. The fact that he might not be able to do what he needed to do didn't enter his head as he reacted in need and abject fear. His mind conjured what was required and the tarbosaurus' charge was brought to a stunning halt as it ran into something immovable and invisible. Connor was pretty sure he felt the impact through every cell in his body and his vision whited-out for a moment as if he had the worst migraine on the planet.

Somehow Becker had not hit the pavement with a heavy thud and Connor let the man down as gently as he could while the tarbosaurus stumbled around shaking its head. The animal was definitely dazed. As it turned out, it didn't seem to like a headache anymore than Connor did and it roared and charged what, Connor assumed, was the first person it saw, who happened to be one of Becker's men.

Connor wanted to help, he really did, but he could barely see, let alone do anything. There were shouts coming from several directions and he kind of got that the special forces guys were making a coordinated attack, but he was feeling very dazed. It only registered that the tarbosaurus had decided enough was enough and gone back to the anomaly when he felt it go through and, by then, everything was beginning to look very fuzzy on the edges.

"Everyone okay?" he asked, since it was about all he could concentrate on as people began to appear from their vantage points.

"Looks like it," Becker said, doing, what Connor deduced was a quick head count.

"Great," he replied and then passed out into the shocked man's arms.

====

Connor was getting used to waking up with a headache from hell, but not to being moving as well and he opened his eyes to find that he was in a vehicle. He was strapped in and propped up on someone's shoulder, that he soon discovered belonged to Becker. He groaned as soon as he tried to move his head.

"Here," Becker said and pushed a couple of capsules into one of his hands and a water canteen into another.

"Thanks," he said and downed the drugs without thinking about it, hoping they would hit his system really quickly.

"How are you feeling?" Abby asked from where she was sitting on the other side of him.

"Like shit," he replied honestly and rubbed his eyes.

There was definitely a down side to this telekinetic business.

"How come Jedi never had this problem?" he complained, trying to keep his mind off the throbbing behind his eyes.

That made Abby laugh and he smiled in return; he didn't want to cause her any more worry, he had done that enough over the previous couple of days.

"I'm assuming this is a new talent?" Becker asked after a few moments and sounded genuinely interested.

Connor couldn't help wondering if the man was trying to assess if this made his job any more difficult, but he did give the captain the benefit of the doubt.

"Yeah," he said, leaning his head back against the headrest and closing his eyes and then regretting it as they went over a bump in the road, "since I got fried by that anomaly."

"We were investigating it when the detector went off this time," Abby added for him.

"Handy," Becker said in his usual, slightly detached tone, "except for the whole passing out part."

"Not my idea of fun either," Connor replied and wondered why the universe wouldn't let him just pass out again.

It was just his luck to develop a new talent that might be useful, only to find out it had a side effect that could very easily get him killed.

"Well, we'll just have to call you Padawan until you get the hang of it," were the next words out of Becker's mouth and it took a while for Connor's besieged brain to realise the significance of them.

He opened his eyes again and kind of stared at Becker.

"You know Star Wars?" he asked, more than a little incredulously.

"My brother," Becker said with a slight smirk, "is a geek like you. I've seen all of them at least twice."

Connor brightened immediately, managing to mostly forget about his headache.

"So, who do you thinks harder, Yoda or Vader?" he asked, pouncing with delight on someone who might actually know what he was talking about.

"Oh god," Abby said from beside him and gave Becker a withering look, "now you've done it."

====

It was getting late when Connor wandered out of the shower and up to his locker in the gym. No one would be wanting to use the facilities so late at night, so he didn't think anyone would mind him wandering around in a towel. It had been a very long day. Surprisingly Becker had actually debated the merits of Yoda and Vader with him all the way back to the ARC, but things had gone downhill from there. The professor had insisted he be checked out, again, and then, while Abby and Sarah wrote up the day's incident, Connor had had the undivided attention of the professor and another couple of the scientists on the team trying to figure him out. He hadn't mentioned the whole sensing the anomaly thing and he was feeling a little guilty about that, but he really didn't want to be investigated any more. He'd taken a shower, because they'd used this gel on him with the sensors and they'd had them stuck on him all over the place and it went sticky after a while.

He had considered waiting until he got home, but he'd decided that washing away the day while Abby finished up her report was a better idea. It might have felt better if they had discovered anything over the course of the afternoon, but he didn't know much more about what he could do than the morning. They knew he gave off weird brainwaves when he moved things and that it appeared it was going to be like everything else, practice would make perfect, but there had been no revelations and no real insights. Now he was just even weirder than he had been before.

"Hello," he almost jumped out of his skin when someone greeted him as he opened his locker.

When he turned, he found that it was Becker.

"Evening," he responded, wondering what the captain wanted, "did you need something?"

He had learned very fast that the military types didn't usually seek him out unless they wanted something.

"No," Becker replied and surprised him again, "I just wanted to come and say thank you properly for saving my life today."

That was even more of a surprise.

"No problem," he said and smiled, "it's not as if you wouldn't have done the same for me."

"Not quite the point," Becker said and smiled back at him.

That smile made Connor's stomach twist in a very pleasant fashion, but one that made his brain scream alarms at him. It was the same feeling he had had on more than one occasion when Stephen had smiled at him, a feeling that he was well aware could only lead to bruises and broken bones. At least it had the one time, as a teenager, he had tried to act on it, which was why he always did his very best to squash said feelings when they happened.

He never had been totally straight; he'd known that since puberty had hit full force, but he'd also found out really quickly that being strange and geeky and even remotely gay was a combination that could get him killed faster than yelling 'Kirk is a fat bastard with a bad wig' at a Star Trek convention. The fact that Becker was attractive had been something Connor had noticed just about as quickly as Abby had, but he'd also had a lot of practice ignoring such things. It was just the way Becker was smiling at him that was giving him some trouble and he hoped he wasn't blushing madly as he turned to his locker and pretended to look for something.

"Yeah well, you're welcome, like I said, no problem," he knew he was babbling, but he hoped not too badly.

Now the fact that he was only wearing a towel came back to haunt him and he wanted to get dressed, but he didn't dare while Becker was standing there.

"Padawan," Connor jumped as Becker spoke from literally just behind him.

"Do you have to call me that?" he asked in a desperate attempt to divert his treacherous body from other things.

He hadn't thought Becker was serious with his joke in the car, but over the afternoon he had found that Becker had followed through and had managed to pass it on to the other military types as well. He assumed it was revenge for the 'action man' quips.

"Think of it as a way to divert tension," Becker said as Connor continued to manfully search for nothing in his locker. "What you can do might make some people nervous, but if they associate it with something not serious the problem goes away."

Connor turned to look at Becker then; he had never thought of it like that and it made an odd kind of sense.

"Oh," he said, thinking about it for a moment, "yeah, I see; then I guess you can keep calling me that."

Becker was standing just a bit closer than Connor felt comfortable with, but the captain seemed to be completely relaxed, so he tried not to worry about it. The smile Becker gave him for his reply did make him a bit nervous though.

"My unit in Iraq had a tradition," Becker said, moving just a little closer, "made us a very well oiled and tight knit team."

"Really?" Connor asked, wondering if running away before he did anything really stupid would be a good idea.

Becker was just a bit much for his hormones given that he was still holding a torch for Abby and hadn't gotten any in quite some time. After his recent track record he had sworn off women for a while.

"On the front line you save each other's lives quite a lot," Becker told him and even though he was trying to stay perfectly calm he realised he had been backing up when his rear end met the locker, "but we wanted to make sure our gratitude never went unspoken."

When Becker moved again, the captain was definitely in his personal space and in the back of Connor's mind a voice was telling him that Becker had seen his reaction and was going to use it against him, while another voice was screaming that Becker seemed to be coming on to him. They were both shouting so loud that Connor was frozen in indecision.

"We had a rewards system," Becker said, looking him straight in the eyes.

He swallowed hard and tried to think of something to say.

"What kind of rewards?" he heard himself ask and then mentally kicked himself for walking straight into whatever game Becker was playing.

"No wives or girlfriends in the field, or boyfriends or husbands for that matter," Becker said, leaning in and making him flatten himself against the locker completely, "and there's only so much a guy can take of his own hand."

The little voices at the back of Connor's mind were now chanting 'Oh god' in perfect harmony.

"Now," Becker said in a very low, sexy tone, "what I thought I saw just now was you checking me out, which is flattering and makes me think you wouldn't be averse to a little reward. What do you say?"

"Um," was about as close as Connor made it to coherent, which it seemed in Becker speak was 'yes', because the next thing Connor knew, his towel was being whipped away with practiced efficiency.

One of his little voices had now gone totally non-verbal and the other was telling him that this was the point Becker called him a nancy boy and made it into a huge joke. That voice went very silent as Becker slowly knelt down and Connor finally figured out what was going to happened.

"Holy fuck," was what he said when Becker took his rapidly hardening cock into his mouth and he grabbed for the door of the locker to stop himself falling over.

Connor had had a total of two blowjobs in his life, one of which it turned out had been a bet and the other, well the other he didn't want to think about because that part of his life was over and he was not revisiting it. However, neither of the downsides of those experiences had stopped him thinking blowjobs were one of the best things known to man and he felt his brain melting in almost direct proportion to how hard his cock was becoming. He didn't need anything to compare it to, to know that Becker was good, in fact he was rapidly coming to the conclusion that Becker was bloody brilliant.

It was divine torture as Becker sucked him and licked him and held his hips in a vice like grip that meant he could in no way satisfy himself and was at the captain's complete mercy. He was all too aware that they were in a public area and anyone could come to find him, but that just made it all the more exciting. He'd never realised he had an exhibitionist streak before, but it seemed he did. Standing in the locker room, naked, harder than he'd ever been in his life, with Becker on his knees; he very definitely wasn't feeling inhibited.

The fact was, Becker was too good and he was too on edge for it to last all that long. It was amazing and parts of him wanted it to go on and on, but his stamina wasn't that good.

"Gonna," he tried to warn Becker, but all the man did was suck him harder.

That was it, there wasn't anything he could do about it as he came hard with a muffled shout that was only muffled because he shoved his fist in his mouth at the last second. The edges of his vision went white, he squeezed his eyes shut and after that he barely had any control of his motor functions for several long seconds. It was better than good and the only reason he managed to stay standing was the fact that he was clinging to the locker with one hand.

It was the sound of Becker laughing that made him open his eyes again and for a second he thought Becker might be laughing at him, but the man was looking at the place on the floor Connor had put his shampoo while he opened his locker. The bottle was erupting like a volcano.

"Now that," Becker said, standing up and giving him a very self-satisfied grin, "I have never seen before."

Connor couldn't even put two thoughts together to come up with anything to say. Smiling, Becker gave him his towel back.

"Thank you," was all Becker said and then turned to leave.

The captain was almost out of the room when Connor's brain finally rebooted.

"Becker," he said, still clinging on to the locker for dear life, "did your unit really have a rewards system?"

Becker turned back and looked at him then.

"No," Becker said, clearly amused, but not condescending, "would have been fun though, and I didn't think you'd let me if I just told you I wanted to blow you."

Then Becker walked out and Connor let himself slide down the locker to the floor. That had been mind blowing and it was only the fact that the floor was cold that made him move. Not quite the way he had expected his day to end, but he did feel a hell of a lot more relaxed.

====

Once they were home, Connor had had a good couple of hours of very restful sleep, but then he'd woken up (luckily not floating this time) and been unable to drop off again. Mostly it was because his head was spinning with thoughts that would not go away and so he sorted them out in his mind instead. That was why he was up before Abby, had fed Rex, made tea and toast and was waiting for her when she appeared ready for the day.

What the encounter in the gym the previous evening had done for him most, other than make him sleep like the dead, was realise that it wasn't Becker he needed. The man was good looking and he had no doubt the man would make a great lover, what with being athletic and flexible, but Connor didn't just want that. The person he wanted, the person he loved, was Abby and he had been avoiding it for too long.

He had once admitted what he really felt, told her the truth, but then, back in the real world he hadn't been able to say it again. Well he was done being a coward.

"Tea and toast," he said as Abby walked out of her room and he presented them to her with a flourish.

"You're scarily chipper this morning," was Abby's comment on that, but she did accept his offerings.

"I slept great and didn't wake up levitating," he said and smiled; "both pluses in my book."

Abby smiled back and tucked into her breakfast.

"No headaches this morning?" Abby asked as she polished off her toast.

They had learned quite some time ago to eat fast, since anomalies did not tend to observe meal times and they were often interrupted.

"Nope," Connor said and to demonstrate he held out his hand and pulled the butter knife to him along the counter, "doesn't even hurt anymore when I do that. I think the professor's theory is on the money; the more I do it the less it will hurt. Like an exercise regime or something."

Abby looked very pleased at that.

"Becker's going to have to start calling you Obi Wan soon," she said and put the plate he had given her back on the counter.

When Abby walked over to the fridge to get something out of it, Connor decided it was a now or never moment and followed her. When she turned, juice carton in hand he was standing in front of her.

"Something I can do for you, Conn?" Abby asked with an amused smile, but Connor did not give the expected answering grin.

They had been dancing around each other so long and Connor was not backing away this time.

"If I kiss you, are you going to hit me?" he asked, having decided to be direct.

Becker's approach had been a little too direct for this situation, but it had made him think and given him ideas.

"W..what?" Abby asked, clearly surprised by the question.

"If I kiss you, will you hit me and yell?" he reiterated his question. "Because I've been thinking and, frankly, with what we do we could be dead tomorrow and I'm in love with you and I'd like to kiss you if you wouldn't mind."

He had no intention of being as forward with Abby as Becker had been with him, because that just wasn't him, but he was done with subtle and done with waiting. Abby just stared at him as if he had grown another head.

"'k," she finally said in a tiny voice, that was very un-Abby like.

Having planned everything in his head, he then discovered it was nothing like he had been thinking, but that didn't stop him stepping forward, sliding his hand into the short, soft hair at the nape of Abby's neck and leaning down to place his lips over hers. The kiss was soft and gentle to begin with, little more than a brush of lips on lips, but, when Abby wound an arm around him and pulled him closer, it changed and deepened. Abby's mouth opened to him and she tasted like toast and jam, but he really didn't care as he took what was offered, plundering her mouth and allowing Abby to plunder in return.

It was everything he had hoped it would be and more and he wound both arms around her, pulling Abby flush with his body, feeling her petit form against him. Abby had one arm tightly around him as well, but the other was still at her side holding the juice carton and he felt her reaching blindly for the side to put it down.

"Oh bug..." he felt more than heard Abby say as she let go and he broke the kiss turning just in time to see the carton falling off the edge where it had been perched.

He reacted without hesitation and it stopped about a foot off the floor and floated gently back to where it was supposed to be. Then he looked back at Abby.

"Useful," she said with something in her eyes that would have once frightened him, but that he was quite happy to meet as she dragged him back into the kiss.

He absently wondered if they were going to be late for work and then discarded the thought as not giving a damn. He had Abby in his arms, Abby who was kissing him with all the passion he had ever dreamed she could have and he wasn't about to let go.

**The End**


End file.
